Re: Is FreeBSD ready for desktop (Mozilla Flash)

From: David TY (no_at_thank.you)
Date: 09/13/05 

Date: Tue, 13 Sep 2005 19:24:16 +1000

Just tell your story in plain matter-of-fact English.
Until you do I hope that no-one will waste bandwidth on you.

I'm totally new to *nix and freeBSD, but very experienced
in computers. freeBSD gets my vote and IMO the
documentation is superb.

"Conrad" <nospam@nowhere.com> wrote in message
news:pan.2005.09.08.12.02.23.144714@nowhere.com...
># note: all dates are in American format mm/dd/yy
>
> # 09/05/05 Installed new FreeBSD - 5.4
>
> This is the allegedly "stable" version - right?
>
> OK, here's a simple run-through of doing somthing totally weird,
> something totally outrageous, something so far out there that
> only maybe 2 or 3 really superior humans in the world have ever
> even attempted - let alone succeeded - getting Flash to work with
> Mozilla - or Firefox... or anything.
>
> First of all, my bleeding edge motherboard with onboard video is
> not handled. What is this wonder of digital electronics? Some
> bizarre prototype made by an experimental "skunk-works" group
> in Area 51 that specializes in leaking alien technology into
> mainstream human production? 'fraid not - it's a fairly boring
> MSI Via motherboard - to be specific, a model K8MM-V. MSI
> makes about 14-jillion motherboards per year. Not particularly
> exotic - or "bleeding edge".
>
> The install totally fails to figure out the onboard video, and
> settles on selecting the VESA driver as the best possible driver.
> (hint: some sort of attempt at the unichrome driver would have
> been nice)
>
> Of course, in spite of the fact that I also have a very generic
> monitor, (an AOC model 7F), somehow the install fails to detect
> such bizarre and weird parameters as the horizontal synch and
> vertical refresh - which I must configure manually, in order
> to even get an X desktop. (hint: basic identification of
> generic hardware would also be nice)
>
> OK, that may be an XOrg problem, but it's still a problem.
>
> Next, having finally gotten an X desktop, I fire up Mozilla.
> More bad news. The first site I hit tells me I have no Flash
> support. OK, OK, in spite of the fact that when I installed
> BSD I asked for a fairly complete X desktop, Flash is just too
> new, too wild, too far out there to consider for inclusion.
>
> So I go to the handbook. No, I go to ***THE HANDBOOK***. You
> know, the one that every time you mention it, there are sounds
> of heavenly trumpets in the background?
>
> What does ***THE HANDBOOK*** say? I quote, chapter and verse:
> "Macromedia Flash plugin is not available for FreeBSD. However,
> a software layer (wrapper) for running the Linux version of
> the plugin exists. This wrapper also supports Adobe® Acrobat®
> plugin, RealPlayer plugin and more."
>
> Cool. I mean, the Linux emulation on FreeBSD is highly praised,
> right? The BSD developers have pulled a miracle out of their
> respective butts, and against incredible odds have managed to
> support one completely open-source *nix on another completely
> open-source *nix. Nothing so trivial as supporting, say, a
> completely obscure, closed source O/S. I mean any code weenie
> could whip up something that would let users say, run MS Word
> on their Linux desktop in a weekend. But supporting one *nix
> on another *nix? That's bloody astounding.
>
> We return to ***THE HANDBOOK*** (sound of heavenly trumpets).
> I quote again "Install the www/linuxpluginwrapper port. This
> port requires emulators/linux_base which is a large port. Follow
> the instructions displayed by the port to setup your
> /etc/libmap.conf correctly!"
>
> OK, I need to install the linuxpluginwrapper port. I will
> ignore for the moment the fact that documenting full
> pathnames might be nice, i.e. /usr/ports/www/linuxpluginwrapper,
> which is where I go to do a make install. Which fails.
> Why does it fail? Because of a dependency on a very weird
> and obscure piece of software that almost nobody has ever
> heard of - Acrobat Reader.
>
> The file required by the port...just...doesn't... exist.
> Let me repeat. A plugin wrapper port that purports to install
> a handful of the most common plugins in the known universe
> just completely breaks because the right file is just not
> available.
>
> But that's OK - because I don't have a /etc/libmap.conf anyway.
> so even if the port had built, I probably wouldn't have been
> able to "Follow the instructions displayed by the port"
>
> At this point, we have descended into google hell. A place where
> there is a wealth of mis-information, out of date web pages,
> which never had ANY date or version information put on them
> by the authors who went to such pains to document their
> particular agonies, and outright conflicting "solutions" by
> gurus whose knowledge of the problem approaches the knowledge
> of South American rain forest tribes' knowledge of neuro-surgery.
>
> A modest suggestion, folks. Drop the desktop support. Just
> get rid of it. It's clearly beyond your scope, which is
> apparently devoted to niche server markets. This is coming
> from someone who actually recommends, installs and supports
> a number of FreeBSD servers performing valiant duty as web
> servers, mail servers and file servers. I am pleased to
> report that I have enjoyed maintaining servers that have
> maintained collectively nearly a half century of uptime
> with zero O/S-related downtime. There have been motherboard
> failures, dead CPU fans, extended power outages, but never
> an O/S failure.
>
> In the face of such sterling server performance, it is
> altogether too tempting to use FreeBSD on the desktop. The
> headlines are grabbed by the question "Is Linux ready for
> the desktop?" I propose another question "Does FreeBSD
> know the desktop exists?" That question comes from someone
> who PREFERS to use FreeBSD for the desktop. I find it more
> responsive under load, it boots faster, it seems less likely
> given identical software and hardware to descend into swap
> hell... in short, it just feels better than that penguin
> product.
>
> But if FreeBSD is to provide desktop functionality, then
> some attempt must be made to recognize at a minimum, what
> should work on a desktop. When the most popular browser
> on the planet (barring M$ Internet Exploiter) can't be made
> to "just work" with the most popular plugins on the planet,
> then, in my modest opinion, something is really, really,
> wrong. And support doesn't just mean the desktop works -
> it means providing correct documentation. It means putting
> things in the right place. Should thing like libmap.conf
> really go in /etc ... or should it be in /usr/local/etc,
> or even, /usr/compat/linux/etc?
>
> In the meantime, I can develop, say wxPython applications -
> but I still can't hit a website with Flash content.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Conrad
>
>